1. Field of Invention
The present disclosure relates in general to biometric systems and more particularly, to searching techniques for multiple modalities in a biometric database.
2. Description of Related Art
Biometrics is the science of capturing and analyzing biological data such as, but not limited DNA, fingerprints, eye retinas and irises, voice patterns, facial patterns and hand measurements, for authentication and/or identification purposes. Authentication by biometric verification is becoming increasingly common in corporate and public security systems, consumer electronics and point of sale applications. Identification by biometric matching is increasingly important in law enforcement and national security.
A biometric engine comprises software and/or hardware that controls different components of a biometric system. The biometric engine controls the enrollment, capture, extraction, comparison and matching of biometric data from a user, i.e., client. The biometric engine provides authentication services to client applications and clients, where the identity of one or more clients can be verified or ascertained in a determined population using one or more biometric modalities, e.g., face, finger, retina, palm, voice, etc. A score or probability may be returned by the biometric engine to indicate successful or failed verification or identification without having to send personal information. U.S. Pat. Nos. 7,298,873; 7,362,884; 7,596,246; and 7,606,396; which are all incorporated by reference in their entireties, disclose exemplary biometric systems and biometric engines.
Biometric databases often contain millions of biometric data records. For example, the Integrated Automated Fingerprint Identification System (IAFIS) is a national automated fingerprint identification and criminal history system maintained by the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI). IAFIS is the largest biometric database in the world, housing the fingerprints and criminal histories of over 75 million subjects in the criminal master file, 39 million civil prints and fingerprints from 73,000 known and suspected terrorists processed by the U.S. or by international law enforcement agencies. On average, IAFIS receives over 160,000 tenprint fingerprint submissions per day. In large biometric databases, identification of a person needs to be determined in a fast and accurate way, and in real-time. Thus, a need exists for an effective, fast, and efficient technique of database searching in biometric databases.